


Time, it needs time, to win back your love again

by lomku



Category: Avengers (Comics), Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Civil War (Marvel), Enemies to Lovers, First Kiss, Fix-It of Sorts, Getting Together, Hopeful Ending, Incursions (Marvel), M/M, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Time Loop, Unrequited Love, hickmanvengers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:34:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24777709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lomku/pseuds/lomku
Summary: “So what are we going to do about it?”“Now? Now I’m going to beat you bloody.”Steve remembers, and he goes to Tony to confront him, but in the ensuing fight, a time loop is created, trapping Steve and Tony together. Will they be able to set their differences aside long enough to work on breaking the time loop?
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 46
Kudos: 153
Collections: Team Angst





	Time, it needs time, to win back your love again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_casual_cheesecake](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_casual_cheesecake/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Round and Round and Round](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24686092) by [positronic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/positronic/pseuds/positronic). 



> Title is from the song "Still Loving You" by Scorpions. I warmly recommend listening to this song to set the mood for this fic.
> 
> Thank you to the_casual_cheesake for the cheerleading and help! This fic is dedicated to you :)
> 
> This fic is a fill for Team Angst in the SteveTony games.
> 
> The fic takes place during issue 29 of Avengers(2013). 
> 
> It started out as a simple remix of Round and Round and Round, but it got a life of its own and turned into this mosntrosity instead. Enjoy my first 616 fic!

_“So what are we going to do about it?”_

_“Now? Now I’m going to beat you bloody.”_

* * *

You can’t really appreciate the true, explosive, _deadly_ , power of a super-soldier until he’s straddling you, pinning you to the ground, doing his best to rip you in half.

Trying to fight against Captain America in his full righteous fury is futile. Whatever you do, he’ll find a way to win. Because he’s right. Because he stands for what is true, for what is good. He’ll even die if he has to. But you’ll always lose in the end. He knows it, you know it, but you’ll still try because you have no other choice, because you have to, because this is for the greater good, and he’ll shout at you that you’ve got everything wrong, that you used him, that you betrayed him, and that _you’ll pay for it_.

The irony of the situation isn’t lost on Tony. He’s here, in his workshop, in his home, surrounded by his teammates, but he knows no one will come to help him. It’s his fault, anyways. It’s his armours that are shooting at Thor, restraining Black Widow, exploding around Hawkeye’s arrows, making sure Hyperion and Starbrand are too distracted to realise that this isn’t a brawl, isn’t a mere disagreement, is anything other that the collapse of the lie Tony has spent months cultivating, protecting, all the while knowing it would come to this if Steve ever found out. Tony doesn’t need to remember the final moments of the war to know that this is what Steve looks like when he’s about to kill you.

If you asked Tony how he would like to die, he’d answer something like this: Surrounded by his team, by his family, fighting to protect the Earth, the Universe, maybe reality itself, making the ultimate sacrifice to save the others. A hero’s death.

If you asked Tony how he deserved to die, he’d never tell you that dying at the hands of the man he’s wronged the most is the most fitting death he could have.

Looks like Tony will get the death he deserves, after all.

He could activate his unibeam. He could shoot a missile in Steve’s face. He could raise his palms, put them on Steve’s ears, and scramble his brain. He could make his suits self-destruct and take the whole tower with him. He could surrender, ask for the help of the Avengers, try to stop the Illuminati from doing the unthinkable.

He deactivates his suit when Steve punches him straight on the Repulsor Core One. To anyone, it’ll look like Steve broke his suit. After all, it’s happened before, right? Steve always manages to break Tony’s armours before he can seriously hurt him.

(Tony knows what the iron man looks like when he consciously lets himself lose, when he stops fighting, when he misses lethal shots that would have killed Steve in a millisecond on purpose. He doesn’t remember, but he saw the footage.)

His suit breaks apart under Steve’s rage, the shield cutting and ripping.

Soon.

Tony pretends to struggle, thinks about Steve holding the gauntlet in his hand, the other earth in the red sky, thinks about his hope that with Steve, with the best of them, they’ll manage to save everyone. He knows now that there won’t be any coming back from this. If Steve couldn’t do it, no one can. It might be a good thing that Tony won’t see the world end after all.

His helmet is gone, and Steve has his shield high, ready to strike the killing blow, but he falters suddenly, going pale. He hesitates, a full second, and the murderous edge of his rage is gone, he won’t kill Tony.

He blinks, and Steve aims at his chest instead, likely to pin him to the ground. Just as he brings his arms down, one of the iron men is flung into his back, and he falls, and the edge of the shield slices neatly through Tony’s throat.

While his body convulses, choking on blood, Tony has the hazy thought that an accidental decapitation isn’t really the type of execution reserved for traitors.

* * *

Tony’s in his workshop, and the door blasts inwards. There’s Steve, and he’s stock still, the fine tremors in his hands and his blazing eyes tell-tale signs that he’s beside himself with fury. Tony doesn’t know what he did this time, but if Steve took the Avengers with him, it must be something serious.

His worst fears are realised when Steve tells him he remembers.

There’s nothing to do but play the part, embrace his role, defend the unjustifiable.

Maybe they’ll be able to have a discussion. Maybe they can still make something useful out of this. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Steve tells him he used him, and Tony knows it’s too late.

They fight, and Thor rips through the armours, Black Widow and Hawkeye working in perfect harmony, Steve smashing through everything indiscriminately, Hyperion flying with more grace than Tony himself. The armours won’t hold long enough for Tony to escape, or for Steve to calm down.

Thor’s lighting strikes, and his electricity amplifies one of the armour’s unibeams tenfold. Steve raises his shield above his head and the beam reflects harmlessly on the vibranium surface instead of disintegrating his head, reflects into Tony’s chest, and he feels the intense heat and knows the RT core is overheating and they’re all done fo—

* * *

Tony’s never seen Steve this angry before.

He doesn’t even have the time to ask why they’re breaking into his workshop when they could just have opened the door. No, Thor, Black Widow and Hawkeye are already circling him, and Steve stands there, asking him who broke first, and Tony can’t help but point out the obvious: Steve did, and he doomed them all in the process.

Steve fist cracks against his jaw, and, oh, he must be angry beyond reason, because there is none of the careful control Steve always has over himself. His punch is explosively deadly, too forceful, and Tony’s jaw splinters, shredding his cheek and tongue, and the momentum twists his neck until there’s a sickening snap, and the world blinks out.

* * *

Tony’s a little surprised that Steve only brought Thor and Black Widow with him, but then again, his wrath might be so consuming that he can’t think clearly anymore. For all he knows, they’re here to stop Steve from doing something too drastic. They aren’t angry with him, and Tony wonders if they even know why they’re here. Do they know what he’s done? Do they know what’s waiting for all of them? Or are they trusting Steve to be right, to know what he’s doing, when he accuses Tony of being a traitor?

Steve punches him, and Black Widow doesn’t move, but Thor puts a hand on Steve’s shoulder, tells him to calm himself down, that he won’t attack Stark without reason. Steve snarls at that, and why shouldn’t he? He remembers, he knows how hopeless the situation is, he knows that Tony lied to him, and after everything they’ve been through, they might not make it out of this. How many times has Tony betrayed Steve already?

Steve always forgave Tony, but they never really recovered from the war, and the fissures left after Steve came back from the dead and Tony got rebooted never closed. Tony can almost hear them open wide, the cracks groaning as the fissures turn into faults, that turn into open maws that leave Steve and Tony on opposite sides, unable and unwilling to close the gap.

There is no forgiving this time, not from Steve. Whatever they had has shattered irreparably.

Steve’s telling them what’s happening. The muted horror in their eyes makes Tony’s gut roil. He knows it was necessary, but now that the charade’s over, he desperately wants to rewind time, to refuse to mind-wipe Steve, at the risk of getting mind-wiped too. He wants to curl up, let the incursions swallow him whole, anything to avoid the ire of the man he would do anything for. He wants to drop to his knees and beg for forgiveness, anything to redeem himself.

Of course, he doesn’t, because there’s a bigger picture, because if saving their universe means alienating Steve, Tony won’t hesitate, even if it tears his heart apart.

He pushes himself up, meaning to activate his suits, make Steve vent his frustrations on his armours, but Steve sees him move and slams into him.

He propels himself against Tony, and they crash into the wall, Steve’s eyes boring into Tony’s as his skull cracks against the reinforced steel. Steve’s screaming in his face, but he can’t hear him, and one of his eyes doesn’t work anymore, and there’s something sticky oozing into his hair and neck, and his legs give out at the same time Steve’s expression shifts from furious to confused. He doesn’t register falling to the ground, because he can’t see anymore, and then he can’t feel, and then he can’t think.

* * *

Thor tells Tony to stop joking, and Tony can’t help but laugh, because can’t they see that there is nothing to joke about? Here they are, the three giants of the Avengers: Captain America, Thor and Iron Man, and one of them has come to end another. Tony and Steve are pitted against each other again, and this time Thor is here, and Tony knows he won’t take his side.

What now? Will Steve calm down so they can talk this out? Does he really want to fight against dozens of iron men?

The answer is, unsurprisingly, yes.

It’s a quality Tony has always admired in Steve, his dedication, his resolve to fight until the end. Steve never surrenders, never gives up, and it has saved them all countless times, but now that this resolve is directed against Tony, it can only end in a tragedy. Because Tony won’t back down either. What he’s fighting for is more important than hurt feelings or betrayal. He can’t take his own, or anyone else’s, feelings on the matter into account. There is finding a way to end the incursions, and nothing else.

Thor is swinging his hammer left and right, but Steve is fixated on Tony, hitting him again and again and again, unrelenting.

Tony realises he might die.

He stumbles, trips and falls on his back, and Steve is on him before he can right himself. Steve is a formidable foe, a master in close-quarter fighting, and each and every one of his punches lands. Tony is very much not an expert in hand-to-hand. Besides, most of his techniques he knows from sparring with Steve, which means that he is at a disadvantage, and that he should get Steve off him, get some distance between them.

He can’t come up with a good reason to keep fighting, so he lies there, and waits for something to happen.

Steve takes the decision for him when he slams the shield into the repulsor core on his chest. It flickers, but Steve doesn’t see it, and smashes again, and the glass cracks. Steve has moved on to punching Tony, and is so focused on the faceplate that he doesn’t realise the core flickers again, and a particularly vicious punch creates a small short circuit that travels all the way to the damaged core.

Warnings blare up in his HUD and Tony knows his core has died.

It only takes 20 seconds to lose consciousness after the heart stops.

Tony tries to talk, tries to move, but his limbs won’t cooperate, and his helmet is so damaged that the mics don’t work anymore. His vision blurs and greys as Steve punches and punches and punches and

* * *

Tony’s working on his latest armour when Steve walks in. He’s in full Captain America gear, and has the air of urgency around him that usually means there’s an Avengers emergency, but there hasn’t been an alarm, so Tony doesn’t know what’s going on.

Steve doesn’t beat around the bush, grabbing him by the throat and shoving him into the wall, snarling in his face that he remembers, remembers _everything_.

There’s no room for misunderstandings. Only one thing would have Steve reacting like that. Tony has the time to wonder how Strange’s spell could have failed, wonder what will happen to him now that Steve knows. Will Steve throw him in a cell and leave him to rot while he runs around like a headless chicken trying, and failing, to solve the incursions? Will he demand that Tony help him, make him betray the Illuminati? Will he use Tony as an example and crucify him for the world to see, _look at what happens when you think you can do things by yourself, look what happens when you go against Captain America, look at this traitor, look._

Steve doesn’t want to talk about it, just wants to know if they’ve destroyed planets already, how many, who broke first, did you break, Tony, why did you do this why did you use me why why why why

Tony can’t breathe, and that’s why he unconsciously calls his armour, because another thirty seconds of this and he’ll be dead, because Steve is so focused on his anger that he doesn’t realise he’s crushing Tony, cutting off his air, pushing on his ribs and using his whole body to pin Tony against the wall. The armour surrounds him, and he pushes Steve off him, because he can’t think when Steve’s so close to him, but he uses too much force, and Steve falls hard against the worktable and lays still on the floor.

The armour helpfully supplies Tony with the vital signs of the body in front of him. Heartrate zero, brain activity zero, temperature dropping.

Steve

Steve is

Steve is dead he’s dead he’s dead he can’t do this he’s dead he’s DEAD HE’S DEAD HE’S DEA—

Steve’s lifeless hand is glowing orange— _he’s dead I killed him I killed him I killed_ — and it forms into the—

Into the time gem and Tony should get away but he killed Steve and he can’t move at all and the gem shatters and blows Tony away and

* * *

Tony’s in his workshop and he remembers.

He killed Steve.

He killed Steve and then the time gem appeared and now he’s in his workshop and he doesn’t know when this is and he killed Steve and he killed him he killed him he killed—

Steve enters the workshop.

Tony can’t help himself, he runs to Steve, needs to touch him, make sure he isn’t dead, feel his warmth, feel his heart. He collides with Steve, hands roaming over his chest and face, and they’re so close together they could kiss—

Steve takes his head between his hands and brings him closer and Tony can’t help it, he glances at Steve’s lips, he doesn’t know what the fuck is happening, and Steve’s hand moves to cradle his jaw and he looks at Steve’s eyes and they’re cold as ice and the hands tighten around him and Steve snaps his neck.

* * *

When Steve enters the workshop, Tony’s already in his armour, palms up and glowing.

He doesn’t know what’s happening, but Steve’s killed him at least once, he’s killed Steve— _he’s killed Steve Steve Steve Steve Steve_ — once, and now he remembers.

Two times.

More?

How many loops have they been in already? Does Steve know about it?

Steve takes one look at him, and throws the shield right at Tony’s head, running at full sprint towards him, barely dodging his warning shots. He’s on Tony in an instant, and Tony lifts off, because he doesn’t want to be on the ground, and maybe Steve’ll calm down if he can’t reach Tony. But Steve is too stubborn to let go, and they smash into the ceiling instead, hard enough for Steve to cry out and squeeze Tony’s arm until the metal starts to dent. Steve’s bleeding from a head wound, but his eyes are clear when he stares into the faceplate, piercing right through Tony, and he’s still furious and this is going to end with another one of them dying if Tony doesn’t _do_ something.

He drops to the ground, pushes Steve off and steps out of his armour, hands up, hoping that his surrender will calm Steve down. Steve’s sneering, shield in his hands, and then his arm’s a blur and Tony feels a _crack_ against his skull—

* * *

His hands are trembling, his head throbbing with a phantom pain. He locks down the workshop, locks down the whole tower, because he needs time to think, to figure this out, stop the time loop. He needs time before Steve comes in and tries to kill him.

Because that’s what Steve’s been doing, isn’t it? At least three times now, Steve has fought Tony with the intent to kill, and succeeded two times.

Tony doesn’t know what to think about that.

Would it be better or worse if Steve knew about the time loop? Is it better if Steve is so angry that he wants to kill Tony, or that he kills Tony because he knows the time loop will reset? It’s obvious that the time loop resets if one of them dies, but is there another way to reset it? Does it reset after a determined amount of time? Does it reset if one of them is unconscious? Why is there a time loop in the first place? How can they break it?

Why does Steve want to kill him instead of trying to figure out this time loop?

Tony’s blood freezes in his veins. There is. There is the possibility that _Steve_ controls the time loop, since the gem appeared in his hand when he died. But why would he…

Is this Steve’s idea of a punishment? Is it some kind of retribution for making Steve forget, for lying to him? Is this Tony’s sentence, to get killed over and over again by Steve? Or is this a way for Steve to vent his wrath without any long-lasting consequences? Kill a Tony, you’ll feel better?

He wants to vomit at the thought. Has it devolved to this, is Steve ready to kill Tony for what he’s done? Has he made himself judge, jury and executioner in the matter?

Tony doesn’t recognise this Steve. He’d never supersede justice like this. He’d at least give Tony a chance, wouldn’t he? Or has he already decided that what Tony did is a capital offence?

Does Steve have the authority to kill Tony? Maybe he has. Maybe he can just dispose of him, sweep it under the rug, and no one will mention it. Tony Stark, the man who thought he could keep things from Steve Rogers and paid the price for it. Tony Stark, the man who died by the hands of his once closest friend. Tony Stark, who betrayed the love of his life to save him but still failed.

There’s a pounding at the door, it’s too soon, Steve shouldn’t even be inside the tower yet, but here he is nonetheless. Time’s up.

He opens it, because he wants to get this over with, but he misjudged Steve, Steve who throws the shield at him and cracks his sternum and watches as Tony falls to the ground, chest heaving, searching for air that doesn’t come.

* * *

He puts on his armour, intent on flying away. If he can’t survive in close proximity to Steve, he just needs to go away, hide somewhere while he figures out how to fix this. Maybe he can open up a communication channel with Steve, work things out with the safety of distance between them.

He gets as far as the hallway, where he collides with Steve and sends them both sprawling to the ground. There’s a wet crunch as Steve’s head gets crushed between Tony’s chestplate and the floor. The panic doesn’t have time to set in properly before the orange glow envelops them.

* * *

Tony decides to ignore what happened in the last loop, apart from the fact that Steve is apparently already inside the tower when the loop starts—and why is that a surprise, they all live here, for god’s sake—which explains why he was able to enter it two loops ago. Which means that if Tony wants to put distance between them, he’ll have to use one of his stealth armours, and fly carefully, lest he recreate the— he doesn’t think about it.

He doesn’t know if the armour will fool Steve, but it’s silent, and if he flies close to the ceiling—thank god for the gigantic open spaces and halls with unreasonably high ceilings in the tower—Steve shouldn’t notice the shimmering of the reflective panels. He hopes.

He flies slowly, almost hovers, as he exits the workshop. Steve is already marching towards him, scowl firmly set on his face, hands clenched at his sides. His gaze is fixed on the door, and Tony slips up and out of Steve’s view before the man can realise something is wrong. Tony rises, and rises, and suddenly he can’t fly further, suspended in mid-air, not even ten metres from the door. He can’t move at all, can’t fly further, can’t turn back, and the panic rises in his throat, because there is being stuck in a time loop and then there’s being stuck in a time loop in an enclosed space.

Steve has disappeared inside the workshop, and the world is going grey around Tony, the colours bleeding away and dying before his eyes. In less than a minute, Steve is out again, furiously calling at Tony, looking everywhere for him, and the gem appears again, and Steve looks at it and scowls. He doesn’t look surprised. The orange washes over them both.

* * *

Tony spends precious time he doesn’t have looking at his sensors, trying to understand how much space he has.

There is the workshop, but anywhere past ten metres from it, everything goes dead. He can’t connect to the Internet, nothing but his local sensors and workshop machine. His phone doesn’t have any signal and doesn’t show a time either. By all accounts, his world is a sphere with a twenty-metre radius. Tony doesn’t need to be a genius to know that that shouldn’t be possible, but he’s learned that impossible is not a word you should use when faced with an infinity gem. If Tony had to guess, he’d say that the time gem has put Steve and Tony in a pocket of time parallel to the main timeline, and since time and space go hand in hand, the pocket of time somehow translated into a pocket of space as well. They’re stuck somewhere, between time and space, and Tony doesn’t know what will happen if they don’t break this time loop. Can it go on forever? Will the gem lose infinity energy or whatever powers it?

Tony’s mind is alight with questions, already trying to find a way to make it make sense, he’s trying to bend it into something at least fractionally scientific.

He focuses on the problems he can solve, and doesn’t think about Steve’s unsurprised face, because if he thinks too long about it, his insides shrivel up and his knees get weak.

 _Steve knows about the time loop he knows about it and he doesn’t care he just kills me over and over and over and over_ —like he said, he doesn’t think about it.

Tony hopes that Steve will let him talk, this time. He shuts down his suits, all his safety measures. Steve should be here any second now. Tony sits himself on the ground, making himself as non-threatening as possible, and hopes Steve won’t kill him as soon as he enters the workshop. The door is open, the lights are on.

Steve steps in, and glares at Tony. His stance is battle ready, but he doesn’t attack right away, and Tony thinks they might break the circle of violence this time.

He speaks, makes his voice as neutral as possible.

“Steve. Do you know what’s going on?”

Which is the wrong thing to say, because Steve is on him, pinning him to the floor with a knee on his back, his arm in a painful twist between his shoulders, a rough hand shoving his cheek into the floor. He can feel Steve’s breath on his neck, and it’s ragged, almost raspy. His fingers are like a vice around Tony’s wrist, thumb digging into his skin, feeling Tony’s elevated heartbeat.

“I remember, Tony. I _remember_.”

Steve’s still fixated on that, then.

“Steve, just. We can talk about it, ok? Let’s act like the adults we are and—”

He screams wordlessly as Steve yanks his wrist and pushes his elbow up, neatly dislocating his shoulder.

“ _Shut up.”_

Okay, he can do that. He’ll just… he’ll just lie there and wait for Steve to come to his senses. _Just breathe, Stark, ignore the throbbing_. In, out, in, out. He’s got one functional arm, no armour, and Steve is only pressing harder, bruising his wrist, growling under his breath. This isn’t going to work. Tony can’t focus on anything but the weight of Steve on him, the warmth seeping through his knee to Tony’s back, the puffs of breath against his hair, and it’s almost intimate, two bodies pressed against each other and the floor, and this wasn’t how Tony wanted this to go, but he’s helpless against Steve.

A hiss escapes from his lips as Steve jostles his bad arm again.

“You didn’t want to listen to what I had to say, so you just made me forget, huh? Just like that? Is this your way of making it right? Huh? _Answer_ me!”

He doesn’t know what to say. What do you say to someone who has realised everything he believed in was false? What do you say to someone who thought you were finally working together, building the best Avengers team the world has ever seen, who now understands all that was just so you could focus on the real threat.

“I didn’t—”

“No. I don’t want to hear your lies, Tony. You’ve been lying to all of us, to me, for all this time. _Months!_ You made me believe everything was fine, while this threat was always hanging over our heads. And you think you can just decide for everyone that it’s best if we don’t know about it? The _arrogance_ on you, Tony, it’s unbelievable. You truly think that you’ll be able to fix this on your own, don’t you? Creating this little secret group, convincing yourselves that six people can rule the world from the shadows. How is that working out for you, Tony? Did you solve the incursions yet? Or do you just bomb every earth that is unfortunate enough to cross your path. I don’t know what disgusts me more, you know. That you’re doing all this, or that you thought we could still stand side-by-side like you deserve it. I wouldn’t have thought you’d be the planet-killer type. But then again, I never thought you’d wipe my mind just because I was inconvenient either, so it shows what I know, huh?”

Steve laughs mirthlessly at that, his fingers tightening.

“I thought things were finally going well, you know? I thought, hey, Tony and I have never been on better terms. The war was far away, I was finally moving on, and you’d even proven yourself worthy when you made the gauntlet and the gems disappear. I should have known it couldn’t have been that easy. And you _used_ me, all that time, you used me and the Avengers. Letting us handle petty stuff like supervillains while you deal with the real threats with the other grown-ups.

You never intended for me to find out, did you? You were perfectly happy lying to all of us, manipulating us, keeping information from us. You’d have done so until we all died in a blaze of glory, wouldn’t you?”

He backs off and drags Tony to his feet, cuffing his wrists behind his back.

“This ends now, Tony. I’m bringing you in, and you’re going to tell me everything you know, and then the Illuminati will have to face the consequences of what you’ve done. No more special treatments. Hah. I should have made good on that promise the first time, instead of giving you the benefit of the doubt. I can’t _believe_ I ever trusted you.”

Steve frogmarches Tony out of the workshop, and Tony pretends the words don’t hurt worse than his dislocated shoulder.

Steve won’t be reasoned with, and he’s right, of course he’s right, he should never have trusted Tony, and Tony shouldn’t have pretended everything was fine when the universe is falling apart around them. He shouldn’t have accepted to be an Avenger, he should have moved away, shouldn’t have told himself he deserved to live in the same place as all the real heroes. He should have told Steve, damn the consequences, and he wouldn’t have been alone with the knowledge that they were doomed.

_Selfish, Tony, you’ve always been so selfish. You’d have told Steve, and then what? He’d have been devastated. You’d have seen the hope slowly leave his eyes as he understood he’d have to bend his morals. And when Captain America loses his faith in the world, he implodes. You’d feel better, sharing the weight with Steve, but it would have killed him._

What happens when an idealist is faced with a hopeless situation? When, whatever he does, it’s so far out of his hands that he can only helplessly watch as the world burns around him?

He loses faith, is what happens. He becomes bitter and cynical and all his hope and belief is turned into rage and hate.

Better that Steve directs his rage at one person than the whole word. Tony can take it. As long as Steve can focus his hate, he won’t lose himself. It’s better this way, really, and it’s not like Tony doesn’t deserve it, either.

Tony’s yanked out of his thoughts when Steve bumps against him, jarring his arm badly. He’s stuck, he realises, stuck in the outer limit of the space pocket.

“What’s—Tony, what did you do?” Steve hisses in his ear, and pushes forward, crushing Tony between himself and nothing but thin air.

The colours are fading again.

“Stop this. I won’t repeat myself.”

Steve’s voice is dangerous, and it promises a world of pain and regrets. Tony wants to laugh at that, that Steve thinks he has any kind of control of this situation, when it’s so far out of his hands.

“This—This isn’t me, it’s the ge—gem” he wheezes, gasping for air, as Steve pushes and pushes.

He closes his eyes, grits his teeth, and there’s a flash of orange, then nothing.

* * *

He waits for Steve, sitting again, hands to his sides.

It doesn’t take long before Steve stands in the doorway, lips in a thin line and eyes piercing.

Tony waits, mind carefully blank.

“So you know about the time loop.”

Tony jerks a bit. He hadn’t expected that. It’s…nice— _that’s an awfully generous word, Tony_ —to know that Steve is aware of the time loops. It answers some of Tony’s questions, at least.

Oh. He should probably answer before Steve kills him.

Something acrid wells up in his throat. This is his new normal, now. Wait for Steve to kill him. Again, and again, and again.

Fucking coward.

“Looks like it.”

He’s so tired of this.

Steve comes to stand before him, looking down on him, keeping the power imbalance. It’s petty, and Tony wants to be petty too, wants to order his suits to restrain Steve, wants to stun him, keep him in a antigravitational field, make him stop hurting Tony, but he knows he won’t, because he doesn’t really want to, does he.

It’d be so much easier if Tony could stop caring. If he could just switch his feelings off, for real, not just push them so far deep into himself that he manages to pretend he doesn’t have them. If he could look at Steve without having those feelings boil right back to the surface.

“How many times has it been, Steve? How many times have we had this conversation?” Because he doesn’t even know that, does he? Only knows that Steve knows more than he does because Steve _wasn’t surprised—_

Steve eyes him, decides if he wants to deign Tony with and answer, and some part of him screams in anger at the lack of trust while the rest of him breaks a little more.

“This is the first time, _friend_. I didn’t think you knew, since you never said anything about it. Have you known from the start?”

And Tony wants to lie, tell him he always knew, just wanted to test Steve, but he can’t lie anymore. Lies got him here, and he’s too exhausted to go on with them. What’s the worst that could happen, anyway? That he’d die? As if. Even death is only temporary in this place.

“The first loop I remember is when I, when I suited up and pushed you and”—Christ, he can’t even say it—"and you. You fell.”

There’s a kind of vague disinterest in Steve’s eyes. “Since the first time I died, huh. Makes sense.”

Which makes Tony’s head reel, because that means it wasn’t the first loop, and does that mean Steve killed him before the first loop, does that mean Tony would be dead, bleeding out on the floor, if the time gem hadn’t involved itself?

Not thinking about it, he reminds himself. _Fix the problem, then have a breakdown over the end of the most important relationship in your life._

Piece of cake.

Time to see if Steve is feeling murderous again or if they can actually get something constructive done this time.

“So, what now? What are we going to do about it?”

Steve jerks at that, and it’s yet another thing that Tony doesn’t remember, one of the meaning-heavy sentences that refer to things he has forgotten, and he’s tired of not knowing what’s going on in Steve’s head anymore. He guesses the same could be said for Steve. When did they let things become so bad, that it’s not even obvious that they’re going to work together to break the time loop? That Tony isn’t sure this isn’t something of Steve’s doing?

Steve’s jaw tenses, a tendon pulling in his neck. Is he debating the pros and cons of beating Tony to death versus beheading him? Is he wondering if he shouldn’t just get it over with until Tony’s so broken he won’t be able to speak, let alone disappoint Steve anymore?

“We’re going to get out of this, and then you’re going to answer for your crimes.”

It’s better than Tony could have hoped.

“Truce?”

He can’t help but ask for it and dreads the answer as soon as the words leave his mouth. He scrambles to cover it up.

“I mean, not that letting out a little steam isn’t understandable, but we’ve got more pressing matters than a little friendly murder between—” and he stops at that, because what are they? Teammates? Former friends? Enemies? Executioner and death row inmate?

Steve cuts off his internal rambling: “You listen to what I say, you do as I want, and you don’t lie. If you even think of omitting something or bullshitting, all bets are off.”

Tony shivers at the frigid voice. It’s good enough. He isn’t in the mood for jokes or anything other but the truth anyways.

“All right.”

The tension in the room isn’t as thick anymore. Steve takes a step back, and waves Tony up, eyes steely and body tense.

What does he think Tony would even try? Steve has assumed control, and Tony doesn’t want it back. Not that he has ever really been in control since the start of the incursions.

“Do you still have the same override codes.”

It shouldn’t hurt, but it still does. Steve knows Tony always gives him his codes, no matter how they feel about each other. He has the same codes as always, and now Steve is stripping the last shred of armour from Tony, leaving him bare, utterly vulnerable.

“I didn’t—yeah.”

A few choice words, a string of numbers, and the buzz in the back of his skull dies down along with twenty-three suits of armour. Tony looks away, away from Steve’s piercing eyes.

There’s nothing to say. This is Tony’s surrender.

“This is loop number thirteen. I came to confront you about your betrayal and in the ensuing fight, you died. Then the time gem materialised in my hand, shattered, and I was in front of the workshop door again, but with one less teammate.”

That’s five more time loops than Tony remembers. Less than he feared, but his gut still clenches at the thought that Steve killed him _nine_ times, half of which he doesn’t even remembers. He can’t let the panic rise, because otherwise he won’t be able to concentrate on anything other than that number and the growing litany of whys.

“Teammate?”

“I took Thor, Black Widow, Hawkeye, Hyperion and Starbrand with me the first time, but they gradually disappeared until only we were left. I don’t know why, and I don’t know why we’re in a time loop, and nothing I do changes anything.”

Tony thinks that the only thing that Steve’s been doing is shouting at Tony and bashing his head in, but he keeps the comment to himself. Best not to anger the man who has your life in his hands.

There’s little to work with, but one theory is safe to voice.

“We could assume that my death triggered the time loop, since it resets every time one of us dies. We could try to see if it resets after a certain amount of time, since the earlier iterations didn’t really last that long. Also, since the time gem seems to be connected to you, I think it might be worth a try to see if you can summon it at will.”

Steve scowls at him, frowns down at his hands, and when nothing happens after a minute, growls a little. Tony is quick to placate him, because he really doesn’t want Steve to be even angrier than he already is.

“Ok, that’s good, we can throw away that option, it’s one less possibility. So either the gem just decided to show up and cause this, or your unconscious calls it.” Tony’s guessing wildly at this point, but he really hopes it’s the second option, because if not, they’re stuck until the gem’s fancy changes, and that might not happen before they both go crazy and die permanently.

Then again, it’s really hard to influence someone’s unconscious, too.

Steve seems to be thinking along the same lines because his frown deepens.

“So you’re telling me you can’t do anything? That this,” he gestures around them, “is not something you can fix? Why are you here, then?”

Why _you_ , of all people, he doesn’t have to say.

And that’s the thing, isn’t it? Tony doesn’t know either. If all other teammates escaped the time loop, it means they weren’t relevant, and that this is something that concerns only Steve and Tony, since no one else has been forced into the loop.

The only reason Tony can come up with is that Steve’s unconscious wasn’t happy with only killing Tony once, and that it will stop when Steve’s rage has been assuaged. He doesn’t voice that thought.

“I can’t believe it. Here I am, stuck with you, and you’re saying you can’t engineer your way out of this? I thought you were supposed to be a genius, a master of the machines, or is a time loop too much for the _futurist_?”

Tony winces. The anger in Steve’s voice is close to boiling over, and soon he’ll be spitting vitriol in Tony’s face, because Steve’s blood runs hot and he needs to shout his frustrations out. It doesn’t help that he’s got a point. Tony can’t do anything, they’re both sitting ducks until Steve sorts his feelings and inner cravings out.

Steve’s never been really good with dealing with his feelings. He either turns into a maudlin, self-doubting man, or he bends them into anger, and projects it onto someone, until the fire burns itself down.

Tony doesn’t know if Steve will be able to focus his anger at him, or if it will explode again, just as it has done before, and lead to another death.

The silence goes on as Steve’s breathing grows heavier and Tony retreats far into his body, ready to take a beating.

“Why aren’t you saying anything?” Steve explodes and grabs Tony by the collar. “Got nothing to say? Where are all the pretty lies now? _Do you even fucking care?”_

He closes his eyes and waits for the punches.

Instead, Steve lets go of him, angry and bewildered, and starts pacing around the room. The mood has shifted once again, Tony’s unresponsiveness seeming to have propelled Steve in a state of confusion and hurt anger instead of all-consuming wrath.

“I just, I don’t get you, Tony! I really don’t get what’s going on in your head. I really thought I did, during those last months, but it was all just a fucking lie and I can’t trust a single thing you say and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do and—did you laugh, when you told Strange to wipe me? Did you laugh, when you put me in my bed and then woke me up after I was having nightmares? I bet that was hilarious, watching me flounder around. Knowing I didn’t know what was really going on. I bet you must have felt real superior. Did it feel good, to do something behind my back? Are you that petty, Tony? That you can’t accept that I’m the head of SHIELD, so you go making your own group just to go behind my back? FUCK. This isn’t getting us ANYWHERE! AND STOP STARING AT ME LIKE THAT! SAY SOMETHING, GODDAMMIT!”

Steve rounds on him again, eyes wide and chest heaving, and he looks torn between punching Tony’s face in or running away.

Tony’s never seen Steve in such a state. At least, he doesn’t remember he has.

“I never laughed. Nothing about this is funny. Steve, I mean it when I say that I never wanted to wipe you. If it’d been up to me, we would have kept you with us, because you’re the one with the highest morals. And you were right, that day, when you told us we would lose sight of ourselves if we started thinking about the worst scenario, and that we would convince ourselves that it’s the lesser of two evils. And that’s exactly what happened. We—I built bombs. And I won’t say I would do anything differently, because I wouldn’t. I still believe that if it comes to that, the most ethical thing is to destroy a planet. Even if I won’t be able to look at myself in the mirror afterwards. Because it’s that or losing two entire universes. Trillions of lives, Steve. At such a scale, morality becomes irrelevant.”

It’s freeing, to lay all the cards on the table. He can’t let Steve down more than he already has, and now at least Steve will know what he thinks.

Steve, who is silent, mouth twitching, eyes turbulent. He’s having a hard time accepting what Tony’s saying. His voice is rough when he answers:

“How can you say that it’s ethical to destroy a planet? To play God? How can you even consider that an option? All life is sacred, you can’t sacrifice some of it to save the rest, because that makes all other life complicit in genocide. You can’t. I told you you wouldn’t know who you’d become, and I can’t recognise you either. How could you do that, Tony? How do you live with yourself, knowing that you destroyed _planets_? I thought you were out of the weapons business, but instead you build world-ending bombs? How… _how_?”

Tony can’t bear to see the thinly veiled disgust he’s sure to find in Steve’s eyes. He looks down, to the side, settles on a point over Steve’s shoulder.

“It hasn’t come to that. Yet. We were lucky, Steve, really lucky. We had the gauntlet, and then the next earths were already dead, or got destroyed before we could do anything. We haven’t had to kill a planet yet, and I hope with all my being that it’ll never come to that, but we’re running out of options. Everywhere we turn, it’s another dead end. All others who know about the incursions keep telling us this is hopeless, that _everything_ will die. And that we’re running out of time. I hate it, but if we’re backed against the wall, we will use the bombs, because I refuse to let you—this Earth and its universe die. I can’t—I can’t _not_ do something. And if that means that I sell my soul in the process, then so be it.”

Tony’s getting sloppy. He needs to be more careful of what he says, lest he gives too much away to Steve. There’s no need to complicate things further. Besides, it wouldn’t be welcomed by Steve.

“See, Tony, you’re saying that, but I still hear the hesitation. You don’t want to, do you? You desperately want there to be another way. I know you. You prepare for the worst, because that’s all you see, but you always hope that things will still turn out okay. So what I don’t get is why you don’t involve as many people as possible in this. What could it hurt, Tony? If six men can’t find an answer, then maybe you could try the entire fucking superhero community! We’re hundreds, thousands, and there are many that are smarter than you! Why do you always do this? Why do you always make our decisions for us? Didn’t the war teach you _anything_? Oh, that’s right, you _forgot_. You conveniently forgot the worst year of m—our life and then you go and make the _exact same_ mistakes you did back then, and the worst part is that you don’t even know what I’m talking about! How can we even get anything done if you don’t remember a single thing? I heard rumours, Tony, and saw some footage from your time as Director of SHIELD, and you were a fucking wreck. You were a wreck, and you were having hallucinations and you were blaming yourself for my death and I can’t make any sense of it because during the war, you were doing so much heartless stuff and acting like you couldn’t care less but clearly you did! Did you see yourself at my—at my funeral? Because you couldn’t even say a single fucking sentence before you broke down sobbing! And I was dead, and then I come back, and you’ve deleted your fucking brain, and you ask us if we really should bring you back, and what the fuck is that, Tony? What the _fuck_ am I supposed to think, huh? I thought Extremis might be messing with your emotions, but you were all over the place! You were fucking spilling your emotions everywhere! And then you come back and you don’t remember anything and I tell myself to move on but how am I supposed to do that if you never explained why you did all this, why you felt it was necessary, because you always have those pretty reasons, but now everything you have to say is that you’re sorry but that you’d do it again. And then you pull this shit and I still don’t understand what’s going on, and I’m so angry I can’t even think straight but now we’re both here and we have nothing better to do and I want, I need to know. I need it to make sense, because there’s the Tony that I thought I knew and then there’s the Tony I see and I don’t know which one is the real one, if there even is a real one. And you never give me any answers, but now you said you’d answer me, so do it. Do it.”

Steve’s all over the place, mixing everything, but he’s right, he’s right, and he almost understands, almost gets it, but Tony can’t tell him, because that would break the last shreds of their friendship.

“I—I can’t. I. I don’t want everyone to know about the incursions because that would lead to mass panic and guilt and they deserve to live in happiness, even if its’ a lie, because the next months might be our last, might be everyone’s last. And I hoped we would find a solution before it would get this serious. We’re working on it, we’re recruiting and we’re putting the best minds on Earth on it and—”

Steve grabs him by the shoulders and shakes him until his teeth rattle.

“You’re not answering my question. Why do you always do stuff behind my back and pretend it doesn’t kill you to do it? Even if you don’t remember, you must have a suspicion as to why you acted like that during the war! “

“I can’t! _I can’t.”_

“BULLSHIT!”

And they’re against a wall again, and Steve still has his hands on his shoulders, and his eyes are burning through Tony’s soul, and there’s a horrible part of Tony that wants to kiss Steve, just to see what will happen, because he’s baring his heart already, why not go all the way? He’s lied to Steve, betrayed him, deceived him for months, so why shouldn’t he make everything the worst it can be by confessing?

It’s on the tip of his tongue. He can’t say it.

Steve shakes him again, and his hands tighten until Tony gasps in pain. Steve lets him go as if burnt and punches the wall, then swears violently.

“Tony. If our friendship ever meant anything to you, you’ll tell me what you’re thinking, _all_ of it.”

Tony staggers back against the wall, lets himself slide down. Whatever he does, whatever he says, it’ll end everything they ever were. Steve has given him no choice. He wants to scream, take the suit and fly far, far away, until there’s nothing but Tony and his thoughts and his feelings that won’t stay down, that come up in his throat and threaten to choke him. He wants to fly into the sun, until he’s nothing but dust. But there’s nowhere he can go, because he’s stuck in the loop, and it’s fitting, in a way, that he’s been running after the future all his life, that it’s been sliding between his fingers during these last months, but that he has an infinite amount of time, right here, with Steve. Time has been running out for months, but now it’s still, and he’s going to destroy everything anyway.

He stands up, because if he goes down, at least he’ll go down with as much of his dignity as he can have, and because he won’t be able to tell Steve without an anchor, without touching him. So he walks over to Steve, and Steve stills, eyes on him, silently pleading him to tell him, and Tony breaks, because Steve isn’t even angry anymore, he’s just lost, and he doesn’t deserve to hear what Tony will tell him next, but he wanted to know, and Tony can’t deny him any longer.

“Steve. The reason I was a mess after the war is because you d—died. When I woke up I was so surprised, I couldn’t believe that I wouldn’t have hidden a backup somewhere, but then I read the news, and I instantly knew why past me decided to delete his brain. It was because you were _dead_ , Steve, and I couldn’t handle it. I could barely handle it when I read about it in the aftermath, and I don’t want to know how bad it was to live through it. I don’t even know if I would want these memories back, Steve, because I think it would break me irrevocably. And I can’t say why I did what I did during the war, but I know I did it because I thought it was the best way to protect all of you, to protect you, Steve. And I failed to protect you, and then I—then I practically killed myself.”

Steve’s white as a sheet but Tony soldiers on. Steve’ll catch on soon enough anyway.

“And what I’m doing now is exactly what I was doing before. I’m doing what I believe is the right thing, and the right thing is not the same as what is best or most convenient for me, or what I would like to do. No. the right thing is to protect as many people as possible, to protect _you_. And I know that knowing about the incursions is already putting your whole world upside down, and I know that it would have killed you to lose all hope. And I know it’s selfish of me to take the decision and the knowledge out of your hands, but I do it all to protect you, and I want you to be as happy as possible, and I can’t bear to see you lose yourself. I also know you’ll never agree with me about this, but I want…I want you to stay true to yourself, and if I have to lie for that, then so be it. Nothing is more important than—nothing is more important than you.”

He swallows, throat dry as he lets the word that have been hidden inside him for longer than a decade come to the surface.

“Nothing is more important than you, and I’d do anything to protect you, to keep you alive, even if it meant killing worlds, even if it meant becoming the very monster you swore to fight, because I love you. I love you, Steve Rogers.”

Steve’s eyes are impossibly blue.

There’s an orange glow, and they both watch as the time gem appears, and that’s not right, it shouldn’t be here already, and it shatters, and Steve still hasn’t said a word—

* * *

Tony’s in his workshop, and he panics as he tries to understand what happened. There are running footsteps coming closer. He turns to the door as Steve skids to a halt in the workshop, and they stare at each other. Steve’s eyes are so wide, his chest heaving, his cheeks flushed. He looks, and Tony looks back, and he takes a step forward, and suddenly Steve is crowding him into the wall, hands around his face, and Tony has a flash of panic, remembering the last time Steve’s hands were on his head.

He lets trembling hands wrap around Steve’s wrists. Steve’s still staring at him.

“Did you mean that, Tony?” He breathes.

Tony can only nod.

Steve looks at him, searching his face for something, and leans even closer, their breaths mingling. His eyes drop down to Tony’s lips, and then they’re kissing.

It’s everything Tony has dreamed of and more. Steve’s devouring him, enveloping him whole, taking and taking and taking everything he can take from Tony, and Tony lets himself be kissed and smiles through treacherous tears. He clings to Steve, and hangs on and hopes this isn’t a dream.

Steve breaks the kiss and Tony realises he hasn’t breathed in too long and sucks in a breath. Steve is still looking at Tony, and suddenly Tony realises what just happened. He confessed his love to Steve and Steve didn’t kill him. Steve _kissed him._ Tony’s legs give out, but instead of crashing to the ground, he’s held in a steady grip, and Steve’s eyes aren’t angry anymore, the storm gone, a calm sea the only thing left. He’s smiling slightly.

Tony dares to smile back, and Steve kisses him again. This time, Tony closes his eyes, and he barely registers the world going orange behind his eyelids.

* * *

He’s in the workshop, but Steve is there with him, and his armours are online again, and the orange glow is still there. They’re still in each other’s arms, but the time gem floats between them, whole and serene.

It descends into Steve’s outstretched hand, and settles there.

The moment it registers, Tony makes a dash for his phone. It shows the time, 10:32, and tells Tony there’s three bars of signal, and Tony lets it drop from his hand, and laughs brightly. He turns to Steve, and Steve smiles at him, and they’re back, they’re out of the time loop, they’re _back_.

There are many things they need to work out, how the time loop started in the first place, how they broke out of it, where the other teammates are. They should be making plans on how to deal with the aftermath of Tony’s betrayal, because Tony and the Illuminati need to be held accountable, and now they have something they didn’t have, and maybe they can fix the incursions with the time gem, now that they have it. The future is rife with new possibilities, but that can come later.

Right now, Tony takes Steve in his arms and smiles into their kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading this, I'd love to know what you thought! <3

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Time, it needs time, to win back your love again](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29039748) by [Cathalinareads (Cathalinaheart)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cathalinaheart/pseuds/Cathalinareads)




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